Bahrain WEC: Hartley beats Kobayashi to pole in Toyota 1-2

Hartley claimed his first pole of the Hypercar era with a 1m47.049s aboard the #8 Toyota GR010 Hybrid. 

That compared with the 1m47.447s from Kamui Kobayashi, who had topped the times in the second and third sessions of free practice in the #7 Toyota. 

Both Toyotas set only one timed lap around a circuit known for its high tyre wear to save their allocation of Michelin rubber for the race. 

"It's been a long time coming," said Hartley, who last claimed pole in the WEC at the Fuji round of the 2019/20 series when qualifying was an aggregate of the times of two drivers.

"It was close at Monza and I felt like I could have had the pole at Le Mans until I got traffic at the end of the lap.

"I made a mistake on my qually sim in FP3 here, so I built into the lap and had a really good sector three."

Andre Negrao was less than a second off the pace of the pole-winning Toyota aboard the solo Alpine A480-Gibson. The Brazilian ended up on a 1m48.003s set on his second flying lap, but had a quicker time deleted for a track limits infringement. 

Tom Blomqvist claimed LMP2 pole for the JOTA team, which had led the way in each of the three practice session with its pair of Oreca 07 Gibsons.

He was quickest in the #28 Oreca on his first run courtesy of a 1m49.932s and then improved to a 1m49.885s after going out on for a second shot on a new set of tyres.

United Autosports driver Filipe Albuquerque trailed Blomqvist by half a second after the first runs, but ended up only a tenth shy of the pole with a 1m49.994s on a new set of tyres.

The second JOTA car ended up third in Antonio Felix da Costa's hands on 1m50.198s.

Loic Duval was was the quickest of the Pro/Am runners in fourth position aboard the TDS-run Realteam Oreca.

Porsche 1-2 in GTE Pro

#92 Porsche GT Team Porsche 911 RSR - 19: Kevin Estre, Neel Jani

Photo by: Porsche Motorsport

Porsche driver Kevin Estre claimed his third GTE Pro pole of the season by just three hundredths of a second from teammate Gianmaria Bruni. 

Estre's 1m56.144s aboard the #92 Porsche 911 RSR compared with Bruni's 1m56.178s in the second of the Manthey-run cars. 

Both Porsche drivers stayed out for a second lap but failed to improve. 

Ferrari edged closer to Porsche than in free practice, Miguel Molina just shading Alessandro Pier Guidi. 

Molina posted a 1m57.327s on his first flying lap in his AF Corse-run Ferrari 488 GTE Evo. That compared with the 1m57.573s set by Pier Guidi on his second lap in the championship-leading Ferrari.

Rino Mastronardi took GTE Am qualifying honours after being brought into the Iron Lynx WEC line-up for Bahrain. 

The 2021 European Le Mans Series GTE champion with the Italian team took the pole ahead of Aston Martin driver Paul Dalla Lana. 

Mastronardi set a 1m58.918s on his second lap, after losing his first to a track limits violation, which compared with Dalla Lana's 1m59.331s.

The six-hour race, the first of two back-to-back rounds at the Bahrain International Circuit that conclude the 2021 WEC, starts at 11am local time on Saturday.

The WEC 6 Hours of Bahrain will be streamed live on Motorsport.tv this Saturday. Click here for more information. 

Bahrain 6 Hours - Qualifying results (Hypercar and LMP2):

Cla	#	Drivers	Car	Class	Avg Time	Gap
1	8	Sébastien Buemi Kazuki Nakajima Brendon Hartley	Toyota GR010 - Hybrid	HYPERCAR	1'47.049
2	7	Mike Conway Kamui Kobayashi Jose Maria Lopez	Toyota GR010 - Hybrid	HYPERCAR	1'47.447	0.398
3	36	Andre Negrao Nicolas Lapierre Matthieu Vaxiviere	Alpine A480	HYPERCAR	1'48.003	0.954
4	28	Sean Gelael Stoffel Vandoorne Tom Blomqvist	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'49.885	2.836
5	22	Philip Hanson Fabio Scherer Filipe Albuquerque	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'49.994	2.945
6	38	Roberto Gonzalez Antonio Felix da Costa Anthony Davidson	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'50.198	3.149
7	70	Esteban Garcia Loic Duval Norman Nato	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'50.559	3.510
8	34	Jakub Smiechowski Renger van der Zande Alex Brundle	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'50.658	3.609
9	29	Frits van Eerd Giedo van der Garde Job Van Uitert	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'50.942	3.893
10	20	Dennis Andersen Anders Fjordbach Robert Kubica	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'50.979	3.930
11	31	Robin Frijns Ferdinand Habsburg Charles Milesi	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'51.043	3.994
12	21	Henrik Hedman Juan Pablo Montoya Ben Hanley	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'51.312	4.263
13	44	Miro Konopka Oliver Webb Kush Maini	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'51.487	4.438
14	1	Sophia Flörsch Beitske Visser Gabriel Aubry	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'51.736	4.687
View full results

GTE results:

Cla	#	Drivers	Car	Class	Avg Time	Gap
1	92	Kevin Estre Neel Jani	Porsche 911 RSR - 19	LMGTE PRO	1'56.144
2	91	Gianmaria Bruni Richard Lietz	Porsche 911 RSR - 19	LMGTE PRO	1'56.178	0.034
3	52	Daniel Serra Miguel Molina	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	LMGTE PRO	1'57.327	1.183
4	51	Alessandro Pier Guidi James Calado	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	LMGTE PRO	1'57.573	1.429
5	60	Rino Mastronardi Andrea Piccini Matteo Cressoni	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	LMGTE AM	1'58.687	2.543
6	98	Paul Dalla Lana Augusto Farfus Marcos Gomes	Aston Martin Vantage AMR	LMGTE AM	1'59.331	3.187
7	56	Egidio Perfetti Matteo Cairoli Riccardo Pera	Porsche 911 RSR - 19	LMGTE AM	1'59.404	3.260
8	47	Roberto Lacorte Giorgio Sernagiotto Antonio Fuoco	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	LMGTE AM	1'59.410	3.266
9	54	Thomas Flohr Francesco Castellacci Giancarlo Fisichella	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	LMGTE AM	1'59.534	3.390
10	33	Ben Keating Dylan Pereira Felipe Fraga	Aston Martin Vantage AMR	LMGTE AM	1'59.538	3.394
11	88	Khaled Al Qubaisi Adrien de Leener Julien Andlauer	Porsche 911 RSR - 19	LMGTE AM	1'59.923	3.779
12	83	François Perrodo Nicklas Nielsen Alessio Rovera	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	LMGTE AM	2'00.263	4.119
13	77	Christian Ried Jaxon Evans Matt Campbell	Porsche 911 RSR - 19	LMGTE AM	2'00.294	4.150
14	777	Satoshi Hoshino Tomonobu Fujii Andrew Watson	Aston Martin Vantage AMR	LMGTE AM	2'00.300	4.156
15	85	Rahel Frey Sarah Bovy Katherine Legge	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	LMGTE AM	2'00.457	4.313
16	86	Michael Wainwright Benjamin Barker Tom Gamble	Porsche 911 RSR - 19	LMGTE AM	2'00.939	4.795
17	57	Takeshi Kimura Mikkel Jensen Scott Andrews	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	LMGTE AM	2'01.877	5.733
View full results